I've watched several of these now, loved the Ax and Seymour Bernstein and DiDonato interviews. I've seen Ax in concert several times, prepared his piano once, and in this video I saw a much more humane and warm character. I never realized, like so many great performing artists, he, too, is afflicted with cases of nerves. I suppose I would be, too! But I have always felt Ax was a top-drawer pianist.

What intrigues me is how they can afford to rent in NYC when they don't have full time jobs!!

It's a tough call going into classical music academies and then looking for a career. Same for all the performing arts. When I was in my late teens I wanted to be on the stage - even spending 2 years part-time in a theatre school - and pretty soon realized I had zero talent. (But I ended up working behind the cameras in television so it was sort of connected.) Some people suggested I needed to be on the stage..."next stage out of town"!!

Ax in Iowa this weekend. At the Friday,4/13, Gala I understand he will play the LvB “ Waldstein” Sonata and appear with the Iowa Quartet in the Schumann Op.44 Piano Quintet and play some 4-hand piano music. Sat. and Sun. he plays the Brahms 2nd Concerto with Orchestra Iowa. Alas, I will not be able to attend.

What intrigues me is how they can afford to rent in NYC when they don't have full time jobs!!

It's a tough call going into classical music academies and then looking for a career. Same for all the performing arts. When I was in my late teens I wanted to be on the stage - even spending 2 years part-time in a theatre school - and pretty soon realized I had zero talent. (But I ended up working behind the cameras in television so it was sort of connected.) Some people suggested I needed to be on the stage..."next stage out of town"!!

Young singers of our generation used to flock to NYC and earn a living by taking paid employment at a synagogue on Saturdays, and another paid gig at a church on Sundays, leaving them free to audition during the week until they found full-time employment. No longer! Nowadays, some are working three, even four jobs (retail, waitressing) and partnering up with several roommates in order to afford the rents, which can be astronomical at $3000-$3500/mo. for a studio apartment, even in parts of Brooklyn & Queens now, let alone Manhattan. It's always been hard, but now it's ridiculous.

The basic problem is foreign money pouring into real estate in the U. S. and Europe as a safe haven from countries like Russia and China, whose citizens view as unstable governments financially. There are whole cities in China that were built with speculative loans but are uninhabitable due to the fact that the cost of living there is unaffordable by Chinese workers.

One has to understand that there are pianists who never practice, or if they do it is in a perfunctory manner because of their immense talent. I am not saying Ax is such, but a famous self-admitted example was Walter Gieseking. The technical requirements of that Schubert sonata are not insuperable by any means for a reasonably gifted pianist.

There's nothing remarkable about it. All one has to do is hit the right keys at the right time and the instrument plays itself.
-- Johann Sebastian Bach

One has to understand that there are pianists who never practice, or if they do it is in a perfunctory manner because of their immense talent. I am not saying Ax is such, but a famous self-admitted example was Walter Gieseking. The technical requirements of that Schubert sonata are not insuperable by any means for a reasonably gifted pianist.

In the video, Ax says he is not a quick learner, and practices 5 hours a day, starting right after breakfast.

One has to understand that there are pianists who never practice, or if they do it is in a perfunctory manner because of their immense talent. I am not saying Ax is such, but a famous self-admitted example was Walter Gieseking. The technical requirements of that Schubert sonata are not insuperable by any means for a reasonably gifted pianist.